Blogs About Reading

Sound It Out

Dr. Joanne Meier


Are word searches a waste of instructional time?

March 11, 2008



My answer:


The teacher's reply:



My questions to blog readers:


Im glad im not alone in my childs struggle to do word searches and feel like there is no vaule.

I agree that word searches at a higher grade level are probably just busy work, but I do think they can be beneficial at a lower elementary level. Let's not forget that a child needs to use their scanning abilities in order to find the words. This is a very fundamental skill for reading that a lot of my students lack coming into my classroom. I teach struggling readers from K-3. It is also a great way for students to review their vocabulary words without realizing. Another plus is that it teaches stamina and working until a task is actually done. A great number of children during this day and age do not have the attention span to persevere simply because they have never had to. With TV and videos games, Ipads, Iphones and such they are instantly gratified. However, if the child has a diagnosis that obviously makes this kind of task next to impossible, ie dygraphia, teachers need to respect that. It really boils down to the teacher's intentions - as with all activities in the classroom! There are good teachers who put thought into their assignments and choose what will help their students grow while still enjoying themselves and then there are teachers who give busy work. The question is who's lives are you trying to improve, yours by assigning useless work that you don't need to correct or think about or your students' by helping them obtain the skills they need for life. It's all about intentions!!!!

I teach first grade and had my more capable students create a word search. They have solved them only one or two times at the beginning of the year when they were still only sounding out CVC words. I presented the idea and was willing to set it aside. I just wanted to see their reaction and they were SO EXCITED. I truly feel this should be only a one time activity that is "required". I did not grade them but they took them home with their personally created answer key to give to their parents to solve. I felt it reinforced focus, neatness, and following through on a long task. It took 30 minutes for almost all of the 24 to complete satisfactorily. By the way, there were 30 words. They were not told to use them all but they CHOSE to, Will I try it next year? Most definitely. Next week we are creating game boards in pairs, based on their focus story and creating questions using the 5Ws. Busy work - no way.

I was helping my 5 year granddaughter complete a word search. I am having difficulty in finding any educational value in the assignment. Especially the words that are written backwards. I have been helping her with her popcorn words all year, she has been doing an excellent job. We read every day, she reads her dick and jane book to me almost daily. I have read the majority of the comments.

I can tell you the application of this assignment is a waste of her time. I am having problems finding the words. I have to go to the letter and search for the next letter, I find no value in this. We will complete the assignment, however I believe the time could be better used. For instance use a group of words and form a sentence. Countless other assignments.

As a special education teacher working with students with reading deficits I believe that word searches can be a useful eye training tool. Students with reading difficulties often have issues in visual discrimination and the use of word searches, jigsaw puzzles, hidden object games, etc. help them develop those skills that are necessary for discriminating letters. Also, anytime the brain is actively engaged in an activity there are positive results that while they may not be teaching specific skills, they are developing the parts of the brain needed to be successful in other areas. Much like music develops the skills needed to be successful in math.

i'm a teacher and i'm doing my post-graduate study now.I did an action research on ‘The effectiveness of using Word Search Games to enhance reading comprehension achievements amongst low English proficiency’ with my pupil. As what had been anticipated, it has reached some expected and unexpected findings. The most significant finding was that the Word Search Games can really help the low English proficiency to improve their reading comprehension achievements. This finding support David (2005,p 96) statements; “It is critical for children to develop fluency in word recognition. When they are fluent, word recognition requires far less mental effort, freeing up the child’s cognitive capacity for understanding what is read”.
“There is no reason to believe that the kind of creative energy exhibited in game wouldn’t be applicable to these disciplines”. (Eric, Scot & Katie, 2009).The word search games help the low English proficiency to enhance their word recognition skill and directly it will help them to improve their reading comprehension achievement. The finding supports the statements by Spencer and Hay(1998) that ‘Word recognition is an essential component in the mastery of reading and considerable evidence suggests that the major difficulty confronting the beginning reader is the development of rapid, automatic word recognition skills.’
Furthermore, the research has shown that the use of Word Search Games in reading comprehension’s lesson is capable of the following:
a. The used of Word Search Games in reading lesson can help the Low English proficiency’s pupils to enhance their word recognition skill. Therefore, it can help them to answer the questions with same keywords in the questions’ sentences to what they have in the text only. The pupils will have problem to answer the high level of reading comprehension questions where they need to apply their high order thinking.
b. The pupils were more responsive in the classroom during the research. They actively participate in the activities. They compete with each other to complete the games as soon as possible. Hence, without realizing it, they had enhanced their word recognition skill.
c. Word Search Games also can be a good mechanism to train the pupils to be alert and focus in their task. They need to look for the words in the letter box and to do that; focus is what they really need. Hence, the games will train them to focus and alert in the class. To be focus and alert in the class will make them a better learner.

My High School Students love word searches before the quiz. The words are all written in English and the
students have to search for the words in Spanish. It will reinforce the vocabulary words before the Quiz or test. It is very useful for developing the right side of the brain skills. Wonderful for world language speakers.

My son is 8 and he brings home maybe 1 word search a month.
It looks like a kindergartner could do it.
I, with my love for word searches, will find all 15 words in less than 5 minutes.
He, on the other hand, will sit there for HOURS, not even trying to find them, just staring blankly at the paper because he gets frustrated and doesn't want to do it. He's not dyslexic, and he doesn't have a learning disability. He just refuses to try.
I don't understand this, but I assume it has to do with the fact that it's not an electronic he enjoys playing, it's a piece of paper with words on it, he could give a crap less about.
I don't know what to do about this because, although not often, on the occasion that he DOES bring home a word search, he gets whiny and refuses to try.....

Word searches would be good for someone that knows how to code in a computer language. I do word searches daily at it has made me much better at recognizing patterns. If I mess up when I am coding I am able to find my mistakes much faster than some of my peers, this is just something I have come to notice.

Word puzzles help with deciphering and decoding skills, which are later tested in life on placement tests like the ASVAB. The scanning ability helps with reading charts, graphs, and other data such as an airport departure schedule board. If educators are not seeing the explicit value they will not communicate the explicit value and they are worthless. However, with attention spans decreasing working on scanning ability is something worthwhile. Those students that are frustrated for hours over a word puzzle obviously have areas that require improvement.

I have never heard of any research supporting word searches. However, there is tons of research support ing many other teaching strategies. Since we know what works to support students, why would we do something (like word searches) that may, or may not be of benefit to students? Let's allow ourselves to let what we know influence what we do.

In ESL the list of words for a word search puzzle are invaluable as we practice pronouncing new words for the next days science lesson. It's an introduction to new words--and while perhaps little learning takes place but as it can be done easily--at least everyone gets a little success--be it the A+ or marginal one. I could care less about the research--it's a great ESL tool

I have actually seen research that indicates that the left to right, and right to left eye movement is good for brain development. When we took our son to a reading specialist because he has some learning disabilities, the professional had us do a word search with our son every day.

I worked in a maximum custody prison as a psychologist for about 17 months. Many of the guys had behavior problems. There was this one guy in solitary for constantly disrespecting female employees. I asked him what he wanted most to help him do his time. He asked for word search puzzles. We worked out this deal. If he could go one week without disrespecting female staff, I'd give him some word search puzzles to do. It worked! Staff were amazed that this criminal would work on good social skills in exchange for word search puzzles.


I speak 5 different language fluently and the way I learned vocabulary was by doing word search puzzle. When I have a bank of words that I don't know in a set language, I will concentrate to find a word throughout the puzzle. By the time I find the word I have probably repeated 10, 20 times, then I proceed to find next word and continue to find the remaining words. After findings the words say about 20, then I rewrite down the unknown words to find out how many word with its meaning I remember. It is amazing to me that 80% of words will be remembered. This is how I increased my foreign language vocabulary. It worked for me and still works. I would think the same thing for other people that want to learn a foreign language. I would agree that in some school subjects areas may not work as other people think. If anyone wants to learn a foreign language try word search. Is not an excuse nor waste as some people have indicated.
























I also thought that word searches may have value for improving eye tracking and eye teaming issues. My oldest son has similar issues with regards to copying, penmanship, grammar and convection use, spelling and accurate copying. He was told he had eye teaming issues after a comprehensive eye exam. Word searches were always difficult for him. My other son who does not have the eye teaming issues but has Asperger's, focus and temper issues also finds them difficult. I almost want to use them therapeutically for him to teach him patience, focus, attention to details and perseverance. He is very bright and is currently enrolled in the gifted middle school where his Latin teacher uses them occasionally with the English meanings listed and he searches for the Latin equivalent. His technique is as weird as your son's where as I who loved these as a child almost find most words effortlessly. Both these boys also despise using paper dictionaries and have similar opinions about them being a waste of time versus the online versions. I don't know if word searches are of any educational use but I do believe they would be of some therapeutic benefit such as the development of patience, persistence, helping kids understand that in real life at a job they will sometime have to do things in a manner they may not like, as well as helping with eye tracking/teaming issues. In the world of instantaneous information at your finger tips I believe our children may not get many opportunities to practice the patience required to do things like offline research. I for one feel that they are definitely losing something important.









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Judy Blume